Saturday 19 October 2013

Tettigonia viridissima (Linnaeus, 1758)

On a whim, I took a trip to the Isle of Wight the other day. In amongst Ryde's endless pier, missed buses and angry Weimeraners, I encountered this:

Tettigonia viridissima, near Culver Down, Isle of Wight, UK
Photographed in October 2013 near Culver Down on the Isle of Wight, Hampshire, UK, using an Olympus E-420 with a Zuiko 40-150mm lens and 3 KOOD magnifiers.
Although its colouring masks it very well in the scrubby vegetation it calls its home, this large katydid is rendered quite conspicuous by its song, one of the loudest noises I've heard from common British insects and performed without any inhibition with (quiet) observers mere inches away.

This, the largest of Britain's truly resident bush-crickets - exceeded in length by the more slender Large Conehead Ruspolia nitidula, a rare seasonal migrant - is the Great Green Bush-Cricket

Tettigonia viridissima
(Linnaeus, 1758)

Like many katydids or, if you prefer, bush-crickets, it is an omnivore, in stark contrast to the usually herbivorous (although not always strictly) omnivore. Fear not, it doesn't eat humans but, having fairly powerful mandibles, it can deliver a painful (but venomless) nip if handled. 

Anyhow, with precisely this much ado, onwards with the taxonomy:

This delightful creature belongs to:

 - Tettigoniini
- Tettigoniinae
- Tettigoniidae  
- Tettigonioidea  
- Ensifera             
 - Orthoptera             
- Panorthoptera            
- Orthopterida                 
- Polyorthoptera                
- Anartioptera                      
- Polyneoptera                       
See also Sibylla.
- Neoptera                                 
 - Manopterygota                              
- Pterygota                                          
- Dicondylia                                          
- Insecta                                                  
- Hexapoda                                               
- Arthropoda                                               
 - Ecdysozoa                                                   
- Protostomia                                                   
- Nephrozoa                                                       
 - Bilateralia                                                                
- Eumetazoa                                                                 
- Animalia                                                                      
- Eukaryota                                                                      
     
And that's all, folks!



For the rather depauperate British grasshoppers, you could do worse than the Orthoptera Recording Scheme website, which admittedly isn't the most user-friendly resource out there, but is chock-full of information once you find your way around... 
 

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